1. Field
The present invention relates generally to profiles and, more specifically, to media character profiles and related on-line communities.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recommendation systems are a type of information filtering system used to predict the degree to which a user is likely to appreciate various forms of media, such as fictional books, movies, video games, plays, and the like. Often recommendation systems contain a media repository (e.g., information about the media, and in some cases, the media itself) and user-selectable filters that allow users to specify criteria and identify responsive media meeting their criteria. These systems, however, generally filter and organize data with the media items as the fundamental unit of data, e.g., supporting searches for books or movies having certain attributes. Users, however, often have more fine-grained preferences—especially related to the individual characters contained in that media (referred to as media characters)—that are not readily expressed in terms of the overall media item's attributes. As a result, users often fail to identify media that they would enjoy and consume media that fails to entertain them.